


Care

by foggysundays



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Big Brother Dean, Gen, Sick Sam, Weechesters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-24
Updated: 2017-07-24
Packaged: 2018-12-06 10:02:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11598318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foggysundays/pseuds/foggysundays
Summary: John is away on a hunt, Sam is sick and Dean doesn´t really know what to do.





	Care

Sammy is sleeping. Finally.

His tiny body is pressed up to Dean´s slightly taller one, arms and legs wrapped around him like an octopus, like he´s afraid his brother will disappear the very minute they lose contact. Dean can feel the soft puffs of breath on his neck where Sam´s face is buried, it´s feverish and hot like the rest of him, burning up even while he´s shivering. He has tried his best to make the kid more comfortable, has made him take a cold bath to bring down the fever and then wrapped him up in all the blankets he could find. There´s still some leftover chicken soup in the kitchen because Sammy barley managed to stomach a few spoonfuls before he felt like he couldn’t eat anymore, but at least he drank most of that awful tea that the old lady at the grocery story gave to Dean when he asked for something to help with the fever.

As usual, they are low on medicine, there´s just a few generic painkillers and band-aids. Dad took most of their medical supplies with him when he left for a hunt five days ago, and Dean knows perfectly well that a lone nine-year-old kid at a pharmacy will only raise more questions than he wants to answer. So household remedies it is, even though he is still wrecking his head for more ideas on what to do for Sam. His own memories of being sick when Mum was still alive are blurry at best, just a general feeling of safety and warmth, the smell of her shampoo and her low voice singing soothing songs while she carded her fingers through his hair. He has tried to remember what the other kids at school have told him about being sick, about what _their_ mums would do to make them feel better.

Dean even tried to call Dad, who unsurprisingly didn’t pick up the phone. In fact, the man has missed the last _three_ check-in calls and maybe Dean should be worried by now, but then again, this is far from unusual.

He hopes anyway. Hopes that Dad will be back soon, will at least _call_ because Sammy´s getting worse from day to day and if his fever doesn’t break soon… Dean shoves those thoughts away forcefully – no use in getting caught up in what-ifs, after all he´s nearly an adult now and Dad would want him to act like one.

He carefully pulls Sammy´s body closer, continues to pet his sweaty hair and sings softly to him until Dean too, finally falls asleep.

 

* * *

 

 

The fever doesn’t break that night. It gets worse.

Sammy is sleeping a lot, but it´s not the good kind of sleep. He´s having nightmares, wakes up screaming and crying and it takes Dean ages to calm him down again. His little brother is also refusing to eat, only extensive coaxing and begging gets him to sip some of the hot broth that is supposed to help him get better.

The school is getting suspicious, too. When he calls in his best Dad-voice to excuse both him and Sam for another three days, the secretary grills him relentlessly and he has to fake an emergency to get out of the interrogation.

Dad still isn’t answering.

Both of those things don’t really matter, though. One look at Sammy and Dean knows that he has to up his game soon or he will have no choice but to take his brother to the next hospital. It won´t be fun, CPS is already on their asses and Dad will lose his shit when he hears that Dean was so careless, but there´s not a lot of options left right now.

He´s gotta try and make plan C work, which is a bit less risky than the hospital, but it also means that he has to leave Sam for a short while.

His little brother is not all too happy about that, he is crying and clinging to him and it takes Dean an hour of promises and assurances that he _will_ come back no matter what, until Sam reluctantly allows him to go.

There´s three pharmacies at the shopping mall and Dean takes some time to observe every single one of them, takes note of the people working there and how they interact with their costumers, carefully deciding which one of them will be most likely to sell medicine to a lone kid without asking too many stupid questions.

The one he finally picks is a rather bored looking middle-aged dude that is clearly more interested in checking out his female costumers than in doing his actual job. He´s still eyeing Dean suspiciously when he steps up to the counter, clearly looking for some sort of parent but not finding any.

“Aren´t you a bit young to be strolling around here all alone, little man?”

Dean swallows down the insults and makes his face look sheepish instead.

“I´m not _little_! My brother is sick, and Daddy is looking after him and I´m grown up enough to go to a shop by myself!” He makes sure to add a pout for good measure, better have the man believe that he´s a brat and that his dad is indulging him than the alternative.

“And your Dad didn’t even accompany you?”

Shit, this isn’t working at all like he had planned.

Frantically looking around for his back-up option, Dean´s eyes fall on the man he had picked out of the crowd earlier already. He´s around Dad´s age and fortunately still sitting on a bench not too far from the pharmacy, trying to calm down his squirming toddler.

He motions in the general direction of the dude and throws the pharmacists in front of him a dark look.

“Sammy´s sick and a pain in the ass. I just want to go back home and watch Toy Story like Daddy promised. Can I please get the medicine now so that we can do that?”

The clerk is still not completely convinced, but Baby-Dude actually looks more like Dean than John does, so he relents and sells him the drugs he has asked for.

For once, his luck doesn’t turn on him and Baby-Dude is leaving by the time that Dean is stepping out of the pharmacy. All he has to do is follow him and his kid and act like he belongs with them. He can still feel the eyes of the pharmacy guy on his neck, but luckily no one makes a move to stop him.

 

* * *

 

 

Sam is on him the minute he´s walks into the room, throwing his skinny arms around his neck and climbing him like a monkey would a tree. The kid´s not crying in earnest, he´s still upset, however, shaking and clearly not inclined to let his big brother out of his sight ever again.

Dean sits them both down on one of the beds and wraps Sammy up in his blankets until he looks like a human burrito. He presses a bottle of water into his hands and makes him drink half of it before he finally focuses some of his attention on the medicine he´s just bought.

Knowing that his brother finds his voice soothing, Dean reads the instruction leaflet out loud, making sure that he gets the required amount of medicine right. Sammy´s pretty much out of it again, too exhausted to stay awake for long, which also means that he takes the pills without complaint, snuggling back into Dean afterwards.

He lets the kid sleep for a while, ignores his own grumbling stomach because movement is not an option right now, Sammy needs all the sleep he can get.

Another fever nightmare finally wakes them both three hours later.

Dean hugs his sobbing brother close and sings softly to him until he has calmed down a bit, then he disentangles them and helps Sam to blow his nose before he reheats some more of the chicken soup. The kid is still not able to eat a lot, though Sam forces down some pieces of chicken and vegetables anyway, preening noticeably when Dean praises him for it.

Since they are both sweaty and gross, they´re having another shower together before snuggling close in front of the tv. It doesn’t take them long to fall asleep again.

 

* * *

 

 

To Dean´s great relief, Sammy´s fever is down a bit the next morning. The kid is still way too hot and clearly uncomfortable, but he´s also more coherent than the night before and his eyes are less dazed.

They spend the day in bed, snuggled closely together under their mountain of blankets and Dean starts reading a new book to Sam. He´s stolen it from the library two weeks ago, it´s called ‘The Hobbit’ and both of them quickly get caught up in the adventures of dwarves and wizards and elves. It´s a nice story for the most part, even though Dean still feels the need to skip the scenes that he thinks too brutal for his brother´s innocent ears – God knows that the kid already has enough nightmares as it is. Dean´s job is to protect Sammy against everyone and everything and he really doesn’t care if the threat is fictional or not, he will still fight it in any way he can.

By the time Dean´s stomach is loudly demanding dinner, Sammy is also eager or food. It´s the first time in days that he actually _wants_ to eat, the kid wolves down his portion like a starving man, and Dean can´t help but give him some of his own soup as well. His brother´s thankful smile is worth the slight discomfort of going hungry himself.

Dad had never been good at understanding how much money they´d need in his absence and he never accounts for things like medicine. Dean doesn’t even need to check his wallet to know that they´d have to be careful with their left-over supplies. One could never tell how long Dad would leave them alone, the only rule being that it was always way longer than John had originally promised.

 

* * *

 

 

When Dad _does_ come home three days later, Sam is healthy and happy again, running over to the tired looking hunter and hugging his knees. John lifts him up in his arms and pretends to listen to the endless stream of words bubbling out of his child´s mouth while he eyes the room critically. Dean knows it´s meticulously clean, the beds are made, the weapons are gleaming, the salt lines are in place, but he can still feel apprehension growing in his stomach - John hates it when he thinks Dean is being sloppy and lazy.

For once his father seems to approve, depositing both Sam and his duffel on one of the beds before shuffling to the bathroom.

“You nearly done with dinner?”

“Yes, Sir. Ten minutes.”

Dad grunts in acknowledgment before disappearing to take a shower.

He comes back looking a bit more awake then before, his stern eyes falling on his oldest and nearly making him squirm.  John frowns and Dean knows he just noticed the slight flush on his cheeks, the glazed over look in his eyes.

A huge hand comes up to cup his face and press against his forehead.

“Dean! I can´t believe you´ve been running around outside with your _friends_ again when I told you not to! Just look at you, you managed to catch a fever! How am I supposed to do my job when you are not capable of doing yours?”

Guilt and shame bubble up in him again and he valiantly fights the tears that threaten to fall. Tears never help. They only make it worse.

“Once you´ve cleaned up the mess in the kitchen, you can start on cleaning the weapons, too. And then go to bed and fucking sleep! We´ll be leaving tomorrow and I need you healthy and awake again for the next hunt.”

Dean does as he´s told, but he´s exhausted and not able to focus well enough, nearly dropping the guns a few times until John finally loses his patience and dismisses him to bed with an angry growl.

When he collapses into his bed, Sam snuggles close immediately, burying his nose in Dean´s neck and inhaling contently.

“Don´t worry, De. I´ll take care of you, too.”

His arms around Sammy tighten, the fever making him dizzy and lightheaded. He´ll be asleep in no time.

“I know, Sammy. I know.”


End file.
